The Athletic’s predicts a horrible season for the Habs

Everywhere you look, it’s clear that no one expects the Canadiens to have a great 2024-2025 season.

Is this normal? Of course it is. After all, the Habs have pretty much the same roster as last year, since the big moves (Juraj Slafkovsky’s contract, Ivan Demidov’s selection, etc.) don’t affect the fall 2024 roster.

These are long-term moves.

Will Kirby Dach’s return to health and the possibility of Lane Hutson making the club help? Will the progression of the young players help the Habs? Yes and yes.

But the fact remains that the Habs will have pretty much the same club as last year, that youth progression has its ups and downs, and that the East has some good teams in general.

We can therefore expect the Habs to be poorly ranked, but the experts at The Athletic have also predicted a horrible season for the Habs.

When it came time to vote for the team with the fewest points in the NHL, the site’s specialists voted mainly for the Sharks and Ducks, but the Habs came out on top with 6.3% of the ballots.

Does this mean they’ll be the third-worst team according to The Athletic? Not necessarily. After all, we don’t know where the other 93.7% rank the Flanelle…

But it does mean that the Habs have a bad club.

It’s also worth noting that the Habs received a grand total of zero playoff votes. Journalists voted for the eight teams that should make the playoffs, and the Habs, like the Flyers, received zero votes for the eight spots at stake.

This is not glorious.

It doesn’t mean that everyone there sees the Habs finishing last… but it does mean that no one sees Martin St-Louis’ club in the playoffs, but someone sees the Blue Jackets (!) in the playoffs.

So we can conclude that another horrible season awaits the Habs, who starts dreaming of the best prospects of 2025…

Overtime

– Change in the AHL.

The AHL Board of Governors approved a 23-team playoff format for 2025

The format has been in place for the past 2 seasons, and will be revisited after the current AHL CBA expires

(h/t @TonyAndrock) pic.twitter.com/KYfcVfwhZj

– B/R Open Ice (@BR_OpenIce) July 11, 2024